Powell Outlines New Policy in U.N. Visit

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell on Wednesday made his first “foreign” visit since taking office--to the international territory of the United Nations--to sketch out how the Bush administration plans to work with the world body.

“It’s a time of challenges, a time of opportunity and also a time of risk and danger, and we know the important role the U.N. will play,” he said after an hourlong meeting with Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Powell also met with ambassadors from Russia, China, France and Britain, the United States’ fellow permanent members on the U.N. Security Council.

Powell’s visit came a week after the Senate finally approved payment of most of the money Washington owes the world body, settling a drawn-out dispute that had led to charges that the United States was an arrogant deadbeat nation. The House is expected to endorse the dues-paying plan.

But the slate is far from clean.

Part of Powell’s mission Wednesday was to soften signals from the Bush administration that Washington plans to focus on where its interests are strongest, not where the world needs it the most. In recent weeks, President Bush and his foreign policy team have said that the U.S. is looking forward to reducing its peacekeeping presence in the Balkans, an area perceived by the White House as a European responsibility, and that Africa is not on the priority list.

And the fact that Bush has yet to name an ambassador to the U.N.--and will downgrade the position from a Cabinet-level post--suggests to diplomats here that the body is not as important to the new administration as it was to its predecessor.

But Powell, one of the most progressive, yet pragmatic, members of the Bush team, provides hope for diplomats here. He has emphasized that Africa will not be left out under his watch and that the U.S. considers AIDS a threat to the world’s economic and social stability and will support Africa in the fight against the pandemic.

Powell hinted that a U.S. ambassador will be named soon and that he, for one, will be glad--because so far he’s the only new official at the State Department. The candidate at the top of the list is John D. Negroponte, a career diplomat who is now an executive director at the McGraw-Hill publishing firm.

“I’m still a little bit lonely,” Powell joked.

The U.S. is finding itself increasingly isolated on some positions, especially its insistence on continued comprehensive sanctions against Iraq. But Powell suggested that Washington is preparing to change its approach in a way that will keep pressure on Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to give up the development of weapons of mass destruction while sparing his people further privation.

“We are reviewing our policy in the region both with respect to our responsibility as members of the United Nations as well as our individual policies with respect to Iraq,” he said.

Iraq will break a two-year stalemate and send a delegation to meet with Annan at the U.N. later this month. At the same time, Powell plans to travel to the Middle East and Persian Gulf to remind Iraq’s neighbors that Hussein’s pursuit of weapons of mass destruction makes him a threat to the region and his own people.

But as hardships for Iraqis grow under decade-long sanctions, Iraq’s supporters have become bolder in flouting them, whether out of principle or for profit. Syria has been importing about 100,000 barrels of oil a day from Iraq outside the U.N. oil-for-food program. Other countries have been breaking sanctions by paying millions of dollars in illegal surcharges for oil, smuggling goods across the border and sending uninspected cargo flights to the country.

“We have sympathy for the people of Iraq. We have sympathy for the children of Iraq. We see a regime that has more than enough money to deal with the problems that exist in that society,” Powell said, adding, “The burden of this is on Baghdad.”

Powell also shot down hopes that the U.S. would participate in the proposed International Criminal Court. President Clinton signed the treaty to create the court during his last hours in office, despite opposition from critics who fear the court could be used as a political tool against Americans.

“As you know, the United States, the Bush administration, does not support the International Criminal Court,” Powell said. “President Clinton signed the treaty, but we have no plans to send it forward to our Senate for ratification.”

When Powell met with Annan on Wednesday, they renewed a friendship that began more than a decade ago, when Annan helped negotiate the release of more than 900 U.N. employees held hostage after Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990. Since then, they have stayed in touch and shared an occasional dinner.